Footsteps into Africa

Monthly Archives: November 2011

Threatening to leave, especially to another continent, seems to make people behave extra specially nice. I’ve been relishing the attention but the goodbyes are starting to get to me; I just want to get moving now.

I guess the price you pay for cashing in your “I’m leaving” chip comes later, when many of those who waved you off start falling out of touch, or gradually filling your space with other people. Better remember that and not expect everything to be the same when I return.

More than anything, one is struck by the light. Light everywhere. Brightness everywhere. Everywhere, the sun. … Air travel tears us violently out of snow and cold and hurls us that very same day into the blaze of the tropics. Suddenly, still rubbing our eyes, we find ourselves in a humid inferno. We immediately start to sweat. If we’ve come from Europe in the wintertime, we discard overcoats, peel off our sweaters. It’s the first gesture of initiation we, the people of the North, perform upon arrival in Africa.

The opening passages of Ryszard Kapuscinski’s account of his travels around Africa keep stirring around my mind as I’m getting ready to leave behind the cold North. People keep saying I’m brave to be heading off on my own, far from family and friends. But my main concerns are a bit more physical than that: how is my winter-proof, pale body going to deal with the heat? How will my poor skin and respiratory system deal with all the mosquito repellent I’ll be spraying around in desperation? How much is my whiteness going to stand out? How am I ever going to adjust my usual speed-walking pace – that even European friends can’t keep up with – to a contented African amble?